Cut Off (47 page)

"Confirm we have destroyed all sources of the virus. This requires the finding of more Swimmers."

"Last time we came through California, it seemed like they'd been wiped out. We didn't get all the ones in China, though. We could swing through Hawaii on the way, see if they've turned up anything new."

"Good," Sebastian said. "But this time, we tie down our water twice."

Gearing up didn't take long; they only had to make it to Hawaii, and the sub could generate drinkable water and grow some food, so long as the others didn't mind algae flakes. On the morning they shoved off, a warm wind blew in from the south, rippling the sails of the yacht. The sub lurched forward. On its top, Ness' stomach clenched. They'd taken the vessel around the bay, but that was a far cry from the 2500 miles of abuse it would suffer between San Diego and Hawaii.

On the yacht, Sprite clomped out from the bridge and saluted. Tristan scowled at him, ushering him back inside to the wheel, then turned to roll her eyes at Ness. Up in the crow's nest Sam had bolted to the mast, she ignored the shenanigans going on below, eyes only for the way ahead.

Seeing them in their places, Ness' stomach released its grip on itself. He grinned and turned to face the lightening sea.

EPILOGUE

The voyage wasn't all fun and games. Within a few days of leaving California, Sebastian had modified the sub's software to be operable by humans.

Ness frowned at the monitors. The new interface appeared to have been designed in MS Paint. "How do you expect me to wrangle this thing? I spent five years on the old one and hardly understood a thing."

"Because they did not let you," Sebastian signed. "But now they are gone and there may be a future in which I am gone also. If so, what is your act? Will you throw the sub away?"

"Of course not. Where would I find a big enough trash can?"

"It is because it is new and you do not like that which is new and surprises. But what you do not understand is that when you try a thing, it transforms from new into old."

"All right, Dr. Sebastian." Ness slung himself into a seat. "Show me how this dang thing works."

* * *

She didn't go to see them. It had only been three months and she thought that if she stepped foot in the valley right then she might not be able to walk away a second time. She did ask Ness to divert course to sail past the island's north coast. A cook fire arose from beside the stream, its smoke mingling with the mist blowing into the green hills. Through her binoculars, she could just make out the three of them poking at things in the fire. After a minute, one of them stood to look out to sea—she recognized Ke's build, his posture—but they hadn't seen the yacht before and would have no way to know it was her.

At Hana, they anchored off the coast where the stream fell down the pools and into the sea. Tristan and Sam got in the canoe and landed on the beach just north of Papa Ohe'o's. They were met by Hana's perimeter defenses: a romping pack of pugs, retrievers, and labs. Helen ran in to see what the hubbub was about, her floral wrap streaming behind her, kukui nut necklaces bouncing on her impressive bust. She carried a rifle in one hand, a koa-wood staff in the other.

"You made it!" she said, red-faced and perspiring, snapping her fingers at the dogs leaping up on the visitors. "Can I quit worrying every time Papa O coughs?"

"To the best of our knowledge," Tristan said. "We're still searching. We were in the neighborhood and thought we'd say hello."

"How's Haleakala?" Sam said.

Helen waved her hand, silver rings glinting in the sun. "One hell of a coffee farm, that's what. We cart it down by the bushel. It went a long way toward opening channels with Oahu. Those people don't seem to realize that just because civilization has ended doesn't mean we have to
act
like it."

Tristan patted a retriever's rust-colored head. "You've been in contact with the other islands?"

"All except Kauai and Niihau, who haven't allowed visitors since the
first
virus. No report of aliens anywhere so far."

"Keep vigilant. There's an awful lot of wilderness for them to hide in."

"Oh, don't we know it. That's why I've been teaching my fuzzy ones to hunt aliens by smell." She knelt and grabbed her pug by the cheeks, its eyes bulging madly. "You'll root them all out, won't you, my little Artemis?"

They planned to stay a few days to gather fruit, bash poi, and take a break from the blankness of the ocean. Papa Ohe'o had other plans, including a blowout luau that required the hunting of a wild boar.

Ness grumbled some (except when he was eating the roast pork), and Tristan knew they needed to be on their way, but she didn't mind the delay. Not when every breath she took tasted like home.

* * *

They hit another storm on their crossing to the Philippines. As the clouds mounted ahead, they transferred the yacht's crew into the sub, meaning to leave the boat to its fate while they hid beneath the waves, but Sprite tied himself to the wheel, refusing to leave his post. They submerged, tracking the yacht from below as the waves tossed it up and down.

When they surfaced, they found Sprite fighting to unwrap a large octopus from the railing. He glanced over at the sub, his face creased with frustration. "Hey Ness! Tell Sebastian to get his cousin to let go already!"

They reached the islands safely and made a circuit through the south of the archipelago, cruising without haste, eyes and ears on the sky. When they located the base—an island slave camp, much like the one before—Sebastian infiltrated a tower to shut down security, then brought Sam up top to cover the grounds with her rifle. The others went from tower to tower, positioning Sprite inside the door to make sure there were no surprises or escapes while Sebastian, Ness, and Tristan mopped up the Swimmers.

The execution was flawless. Having learned a thing or two about the difficulties in wrangling a panicked mob of newly-liberated slaves, they didn't approach the captives until it was over. They offered to ferry them to the larger island nearby, piling them onto the roof of the sub with the top hatch firmly sealed.

It took Sebastian a few days to search through all the files. The Swimmers had been in contact with another group that appeared to be operating out of Sri Lanka. Both groups were aware that the shipments from Maui had ceased; in the meantime, they were continuing to facilitate trade among the humans, but were concerned about the fate of the lab and had been intending to dispatch a mission to a third base on Hokkaido to garner naval support on a mission to Hawaii.

"Sri Lanka and Japan?" Tristan said. "This is like playing Whack-a-Squid."

"You don't know the half of it," Ness said. "Seems like every time we turn our backs, a new group moves in to replace the one we just took out." He sighed heavily. "That's the god damn Way for you."

They restocked their food and looted what little was worth taking from the camp, then made way for Sri Lanka. En route, Sebastian had Ness practice on a simulator of the sub's controls.

Halfway there, Ness sat back from the display and blinked his tired eyes. "I think I might be ready to try the real thing soon."

"I know you are," Sebastian signed. "There is no simulation. You have been guiding the sub since we left."

Itchy panic shot up Ness' spine, but it was arrested by something else: laughter. "Just don't ask me to parallel park."

He took up the controls and piloted them forward.

* * *

Between all the excitement in Sri Lanka, Hokkaido, Kamchatka, and a final detour to Darwin—a many-legged trip that involved much violence, a great deal of close calls, but zero evidence of any further existence of the virus—it was a full year before they returned to Maui. In Hana, Tristan was glad to hear the raid launched months earlier by the joint Filipino-Japanese contingents of Swimmers had been little more than a fly-by; the locals had even managed to drive off the jet before it could land on Haleakala.

After a few nights of revelry, Tristan let Ness know she was headed out for a little while. He offered her a ride, but she declined. "Wouldn't want to freak them out. Anyway, I do my best thinking in a canoe."

She took a canoe across the channel and followed the shoreline until the valley opened before her. They had set up fishing nets and box traps along the black sand beach, marked by floats and colorful bits of ribbon. The mouth of the stream was clear, and she parked the canoe there and followed the meandering path worn into the grass alongside it. As the valley floor began to rise, the path swerved into the hills where Tristan had built the house. Trees sprung up around her. While she was still deciding whether to shout ahead and announce herself or to take them by surprise, the squall of a baby pierced through the forest.

She found them on a netted porch they had added to the site. "Alden?"

He whirled, reaching for a rifle hanging from a rack on one of the porch's posts, then froze. "
Tristan?
"

He jumped up. Behind him, Robi sat cross-legged, a baby swaddled in her arms. To Tristan, she still looked like a baby herself, but there was something knowing in her eyes.

Alden crushed Tristan to him and grinned shyly. "Let me introduce you to Little Ke."

"He's incredible," Tristan said, wandering forward. "Where's Big Ke?"

Alden took her arm to stop her, blinking at the brightness in his eyes, voice lowered "He...got sick."

"Sick?" Her head spun. "What happened?"

"Infection. We tried antibiotics, but nothing made a dent. He went so fast."

Tristan gazed across the jungle, as if expecting to see him jog out from the trees; his face would be hard, as it always was when he was lost in thought, but when he saw her, he would grin and light would break across his face like the morning sun on the Pacific.

"When did this happen?"

Alden looked up, exhaling raggedly. "Last summer. Just before Elsey was born."

"I'm so sorry." She cocked her head. "Hang on—Elsey? Don't tell me you had twins."

"LC as in Lower Case. A little K." He smiled, a tear falling down his cheek. "Aren't you going to say hello?"

She moved across the wooden porch to Robi, who stood, accepting Tristan's nod with one of her own. Tristan had never been one for babies—she didn't even think they were cute—but the boy had his father's nose, his mother's eyes, and both their skin. It was so fragile now, but soon it would be grown, capable of violence and love and making children of its own, and not long after that—probably much too soon, given the state of the world—it would be dead, too. Tristan didn't know whether this was the saddest of things or the most beautiful, so she felt both things at once.

After they'd chatted for some time, Alden showed her around the valley, pointing out the wooden bridge he'd built across the stream, the melon fields they'd cleared from the grass, the wild chickens he'd caught and cooped. She was beyond proud, yet the evidence of his work and the change he and Robi had brought to the valley only fed her preoccupations. Before returning, she had tried her best not to spend too much time imagining how things would go. A year could create a lot of distance. Ke might have lost interest. Been disinclined to entangle himself with someone who didn't know if she'd stay. For all she'd known, he might have found someone else.

But it had never occurred to her that he might be gone. That was the biggest difference of all, the one she'd never been forced to face until her return to the valley. In the old world, you could leave home for months—years, even—and rightly assume that, when you did make your way back, your family and friends would still be there, same as always.

Now? When you turned your back on someone, no matter how young they were, how healthy and strong, there was no guarantee they would still be there when you turned around. The rope that had held them all fast had frayed until they dangled by bare threads. The slightest pressure, the smallest cut, and you were lost.

That night, she hiked up the path into the misty cliffs and sat to watch the moon on the water. She thought his name in her head and allowed herself to imagine the life they might have had together.

Four days later, she announced she was leaving. Alden showed no surprise. He walked with her down to the beach. "Will it ever be for good?"

"I don't know." Tristan glanced back toward the forest concealing the house in the hills. "Do you really think you need me?"

"Not anymore," he said. "But if you ever quit needing to be out there, you know where we'll be."

* * *

"Of all the fucking bullshit in all the stupid world, why do we have to wash
dishes
?" Walt held out the plate, turning it side to side to let the water fall to the grass. "I can run out and get a clean set every morning if you want. Why not smash them when they're dirty?"

She accepted the dish and toweled it. "Because I have no desire to live among a field of broken dishes."

"We could pile them neatly."

"If you don't like dishes, try eating off the floor. Or building a dishwasher."

He dipped another plate into the tub and attacked it with the sponge. "I feel like I should have earned a hero's exemption from this sort of thing."

"If you want that, find a tribe to worship you."

"I practically had that once. Back in my Yucatan days. Did I ever tell you about that?"

"Repeatedly." She smiled and took the dish from him. "But I'll listen anyway."

He laughed and scrubbed the heavy bowl. It had been a hell of a dinner, more than worth the dirty dishes: crabs for days, corn on the cob, washed down with a bottle of Famous Grouse that tasted older than Christ in the best possible way. It turned out to be a good night, too. He slept late, waking after the sun was halfway to noon, glinting off the Northern California sea like all the gold in the world. He was hungover but he didn't give a damn.

She was up and out somewhere. He walked down to the beach, because it was the beach, and strolled south. There were fresh tracks along the tideline. Barefoot. After a hundred feet, a second pair appeared—shoes, treads.